


[Meta] CRWBY: Behind the Episodes

by Liara_90



Category: RWBY, Rooster Teeth/Achievement Hunter RPF
Genre: Behind the Scenes, Fanwork Research & Reference Guides, Meta, Transcribed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-17
Updated: 2019-02-17
Packaged: 2019-10-20 04:09:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 27
Words: 16,772
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17615195
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Liara_90/pseuds/Liara_90
Summary: Annotated transcripts of Volume 5 and 6’sCRWBY: Behind the Episode series.





	1. 1:E1 - The Start

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Source: <https://roosterteeth.com/episode/c-r-w-b-y-behind-the-episode-1-1-v983gh3g>
> 
> [Kerry Shawcross](https://twitter.com/kerryshawcross) (Writer/Director), [Patrick Rodriguez](https://twitter.com/patthewanderer) (Art Director), [Nick Todd](https://roosterteeth.fandom.com/wiki/Nick_Todd) (Pre-Production Producer)

**KS** : I'd say one of the most cool and rewarding parts of working in the creative field is to be able to think about things and then have them come to life. Since the very beginning of the show there's some areas and characters that we've been thinking about for years now at this point, and to see some of them sort of come to life, to see Haven, to see [Lionheart](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Leonardo_Lionheart) come to life. I think it's one of those things where it's never exactly what I had in my head but for a good reason. It's the end, it's the culmination of all the artists that work on it.

**PR** : Once you read the scripts and get a vague idea of what we're going to do we then go to Kerry and ask him what he's kind of feeling about the whole thing. And getting his kind of intricate little thoughts and doing a brain dump from him. Once we have that we can go out and do like a rough pass and like try and figure that whole business out ad come back to, and then present him all these options. For Volume 5 the big thing that we're trying to figure out especially once we read the scripts was the [City of Mistral](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Mistral_\(city\)) itself. And it's this huge, sprawling city that goes over an entire mountain. And we had to populate the while thing and make it feel like this vast, vast thing. That was like one of the big focuses for this because this was going to be one of our main sets. Like, there was definitely like more fleshed-out then a lot of the others ones were.

NT: Volume 4 of _RWBY_ we rebuilt everything from the ground up. So the characters especially got a lot of attention a lot of treatment in terms of being setup in [Maya](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autodesk_Maya), and then [3DS Max](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autodesk_3ds_Max), and then of course [Pencil](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pencil2D). With Mistral, the only real touchstone we had into this season was the final matte that you see at the end of [Episode 12](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/No_Safe_Haven) when [RNJR](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/RNJR) is flying into Mistral and Haven. So that was kind of like this is where we're going to be, this is where a large chunk of our time is going to be, we're going in this city. And that was where a lot of conversations started. What will [the school look like](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Haven_Academy/Image_Gallery), what will the general vegetation and whatnot look like as well. So having those conversations kind of helped inform what we wanted this part of the world to look like.

**PR** : I'd really love it if the audience really gets a view of just like what we can do, and what we can achieve in art. Cuz we've added more, with each season we've added more and more and more characters, more sets, more 2D elements. The subject matter is more. And I hope that people actually, like, see that and can recognize it.

**NT** : As much work as we do it's always great to see it when its lit and moving and it looks fantastic. So I'm really proud of how our characters are looking our environments are looking. As a team like how we're all meshing together to really make _RWBY_ better than it's every been I feel, so, it's a great ting to be a part of.


	2. 1:E2 - Anima Skies Fight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Source: <https://roosterteeth.com/episode/c-r-w-b-y-behind-the-episode-1-2>
> 
> [Gray G. Haddock](https://twitter.com/graymartigan) (Supervising Producer), [Quentin Holtz](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm8547375/) (VFX Artist), [Jeff Yohn](https://roosterteeth.fandom.com/wiki/Jeff_Yohn) (VFX Artist)

**GH** : So what do we mean by VFX in this context? VFX is particle simulations. So you've got smoke, fire, fireflies. You've got explosions, you've got dust, it's all the stuff that just adds a whole bunch of sexy production value in any given shot.

**QH** : In [Chapter 2](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Dread_in_the_Air), [Kerry](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Kerry_Shawcross) came to us and he had this big idea to have [this fight](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Battle_Pages/Weiss_and_Atlas_Pilot_vs._Lancers) that's going to be a ship fight with [Weiss](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Weiss_Schnee). We have lots of Dust, lots of explosions, lots of shatter effects that go on in this episode. We're setting physics capabilities inside Maya so we're setting the gravity, we're setting force fields, we're setting all these different things, and then we have the computer simulate. So, it's really cool to see that final outcome once the long simulations happened, and kind of controlling the physics behind something instead of controlling it directly.

**JY** : The hardest parts were figuring out exactly what kind of effect we wanted. We had a wind effect which drawing air can be a little bit harder to figure out. I spent a lot of time watching anime and looking at different ways in which people had drawn air and trying to come up with something that would resemble 2D but have a very 3D feel to it. We also had some fireballs that had to be developed from scratch that required not only coming up with the base of it but also with some very anime-esque flares so that was kind of neat to explore.

**QH** : I would like to show you guys one of the effects that was really like a layered effect kind of thing. So in Chapter 2 where the ship that goes down and runs into a cliff and there's a bunch of shatter, there's explosion, there's dust, so it's more than just one effect, it's multiple effects layered together to form the shot. So here's like a close-up of the actual explosion once [the ship](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Cargo_Airship) hits. So we have the smoke trail coming down and hits the cliff. The cliff breaks into pieces and the explosion kind of takes over and turns into smoke. Behind all of that we have the shattered cliff itself. You can see on impact how our new shatter tools allow us to take geometry and after we take the geometry, we'll shatter it all, and then physics will take over, so, the ship will hit the big cliff and pieces will fly off. And what's really cool is we can select these individual pieces and then what we'll do is emit dust off of all of those so the individual pieces will have dust kind of flying off of them, so you get this kind of really good trail, trailing dust kind of look that goes on to it. We have the smoke trail, the explosion, the dust, and the shatter effect all combined into one shot to kind of make the entire effects one. 

**GH** : Back in the day all we had was [Adobe After Effects](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adobe_After_Effects) and a couple of plugins. And tehse days now it's a combination of, you know, we're still on After Effects but we're doing a lot of our sims in, using various plugins inside of Maya, so that's pretty exciting. If VFX is something that you're interested in doing it's never been a better time to get your hands on some software and learn how to really enhance your shots with things that used to take an entire company's worth of people to do, years ago. Now all this stuff is just at the touch of a couple of buttons on your own computer, at your desk, so, y'know, if VFX is something that you're interested in getting into, just start digging in, it's never been a better time.


	3. 1:E3 - Another Face In The Crowd

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Source: <https://roosterteeth.com/episode/c-r-w-b-y-behind-the-episode-1-3>
> 
> Recorded approximately October 24, 2017.
> 
> [Jacob Hilton](https://roosterteeth.fandom.com/wiki/Jacob_Hilton) (Camera and Layout Artist), [Nate Terhune](https://roosterteeth.fandom.com/wiki/Nate_Terhune) (Camera and Layout Artist), [Josh Jones](https://twitter.com/Mr_Swazzy21) (Quality Control Technician)

**JH** : Layout is a lot about shot composition and trying to make everything look as good as possible on camera. And so for the work that we're doing right now, we have so many background characters that we need people that not only knew how to do the compositional stuff in Maya, but also be able to look at that stuff in conjunction with hundreds of background characters to try to make everything jive.

**NT** : When we got the script for [Episode 3](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Unforeseen_Complications) it's actually kind of funny because I wound up doing the storyboards for that speech and even then I saw the crowd and I was like ‘oh alright that's not too bad’. I was a fool. It turned out to be _much_ more of an undertaking with a much larger focus on crowd reactions than we had done in previous episodes.

**JJ** : This time around we are actually using different programs this time, we're actually using Golaem as our simulation software. With that we've been able to go from using traditional characters like we did in Volume 4 to actually having simulations now in Volume 5. This means that we're able to lighten up the load on the animations who are actually able to animate the scene, focus on the action and worry about crowds kind of as a background element to that. What's really nice about this is instead of doing 20 or 30 characters like we did last season we're able to get up to 100 characters to even 300 characters that we had in the Belladonna set.

**NT:** What we need to do is we need to actually create an entity and we're going to do it based off of the Menagerie female character that we have set up. So once this comes in we're going to need to change a few settings because in Maya we use centimeter and not meter. If we use meter things get really _really_ small. And now, everything in place, we should just be able to hit play. It plays on the timeline and that's when the characters pop up after they load in. So, here're the actual characters downloading based off of the character file we created earlier. And what we need to do is we need to actually set up the skeleton based off of what we call the uber rig. The uber rig has every part and piece added to it so it's a very heavy rig. So, this is just the bones of it. If we actually go to the [Geometry Tab](http://golaem.com/content/doc/golaem-crowd-documentation/geometry-tab) this is what it looks like - let's just go ahead an fully expand that - this is what it looks like to have every piece of geometry of a [character](http://golaem.com/content/doc/golaem-crowd-documentation/character-file-gcha). And this is just for the female character. So, what we do is we break that up, Golaem randomizes it, and that's when we actually get a file that looks like this.

`E:/Projects_RWBYS_Assets/MenagerieFemale/Inject/MenagerieFemale_CH3.gcha`

**JJ:** I'll take this library animation. You'll see I can get animation put on the [Faunus](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Faunus) character. And so what Golaem lets you do is actually take the animation off of the character rig and go ahead, and we can put it on a large crowd of people like this. And so, you see the characters are moving with the same motion that she has but they all have different timings to give the illusion of different people doing different things. It is really cool once those animations do start to come in and you start looking at things in cameras and you see like a crowd that really looks like there murmuring to each other, or that really looks like they're reacting and listening to somebody. It starts to feel alive again and you kind of have these moments of you know, everything’s coming together, everything's working, so...


	4. 1:E4 - Setting the Scene

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Source: <https://roosterteeth.com/episode/crwby-behind-the-episode-1-setting-the-scene>
> 
> [César Altagracia](https://roosterteeth.fandom.com/wiki/C%C3%A9sar_Altagracia) (Modeler), [Brent Humphries](https://roosterteeth.fandom.com/wiki/Brent_Humphries) (Lead Environment Modeler)

**CA** : The bandit camp is a pretty dense set. It's not that big but it's just chock full of stuff. It has foliage, it has a ton of tents, it has a ton of spikes lining the walls. It has garbage and that's not even counting the characters and animations. So, keeping that set down to a manageable level of polys was quite the challenge.

**BH** : Usually we start with a concept piece and from there we make two different versions of each set. One set is our standard low-rez version. And the others are high-rez, more detailed version. The reason why we do this is so that when we look at our low-rez version we can work on our spatial distances as well as overall layout and then when we finally get to working on our high res version which is our final version, we have everything flushed out and ready to go and we can start really putting in the highly-detailed work that's needed to go into the final cut.

**CA** : Alright, so this is the bandit camp's entrance. This is where a little bit of the fighting takes place. Right now, there's no foliage or trees because it's pretty heavy, we have to treat them as proxies otherwise the scene gets super sluggish. Right after the entrance we have all the huts and all of the debris that you can see here, you can clearly see that this is all scavenged stuff, stolen stuff, barrels, crates full of contraband or whatever. There's trash everywhere, pretty much, it's a filthy place they clearly don't care. There's probably a few dozen huts, like a mini-village. So, this is where [Weiss](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Weiss_Schnee) is kept prisoner, and over here we have the Queen's Palace, this is Raven's tent. It's the biggest one, the most regal looking. and the back of the tent. And from here you can see like the entirety of the bandit camp. It's chock full of stuff so it's a pretty heavy scene. And there you have it.

BH: I think bandit camp is amounts of a lot of different things, its a big sent, it has a lot of detail, it's using a lot of lot of [SpeedTree](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpeedTree). that is something new that we've been using this season as well, and it was really great because we could model a really lush and full foliage. But at the same time maintain that painterly, anime style that we know the fans love to see. We hope you like it.


	5. 1:E5 - All of the Lights

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Source: <https://roosterteeth.com/episode/crwby-behind-the-episode-1-all-of-the-lights>
> 
> [Mark Osborne](https://roosterteeth.fandom.com/wiki/Mark_Osborne) (Lighting Lead), [Eric Tello](https://roosterteeth.fandom.com/wiki/Eric_Tello) (Lighting Artist), [Ariel James](https://twitter.com/ariel_lacroix?lang=en) (Lighting Artist)

**MO** : General workflow is basically we get all the assets that all the other departments have created for us and we compile them all into our light files. And if you think of it as just a set like in a regular movie studio we have the set and the characters but there’s no lighting in there, and we're kind of like the 3D [gaffers](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaffer_\(filmmaking\)) of the industry. So, we put the lights in and make the characters and environments look as best as possible.

 **ET** : We use two different pieces of software for lighting:[ Maya](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autodesk_Maya) for the environments and [3ds Max](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autodesk_3ds_Max) for the characters. In Maya we use a renderer called [Redshift](https://www.redshift3d.com/) which is a physically-based renderer, so it imitates how light works in real life. When we're lighting an outdoor set, we have one major light source which imitates [the Sun](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Sun_Wukong), and then we use kind of a fill light to create the ambient light, to fill in some of the shadows so it's not so harsh. 3ds Max we have a plugin called [Pencil+](https://www.psoft.co.jp/en/product/pencil/3dsmax/) and that gives the characters kind of a hand-drawn look and we basically have one type of lighting we use to fill in the characters to make them match the environment as best as possible or to create rims. We used to use just two zones, a lit zone and a shadow zone for the characters. But this season we've introduced a third zone to create more rim lighting to give characters a separation from the background and also offer like a brighter more directional feel for the characters, just make them really pop.

 **AJ** : So, I'm just going to walk through one of our environments, and rendering it... So here is the environment. Looking through in Maya, and so essentially the first thing that we're going to do is set up our camera. So, I already did that beforehand. And so, I'll go through the storyboards and find which angles I need for the camera. And I have these here. So, the first thing that I'm going to do is add my fill light, and I currently have it set so the textures are turned off. This gives a better overall look of what the light is doing without the interference of the textures. So, this is the overall fill for, I believe this is... morning set. And then we'll take a look at adding the sunlight, and I'll want to render this one separately to see its impact of shadows. And this'll give the overall warm feeling with slightly longer shadows. And then we'll want to mix those together. So here it is, with just the fill and cue light for the sun on without the textures. And it looks overblown but when we turn the textures back on you get a nice, overall warm morning feel.

`Autodesk Maya 2017 D:\Projects\RWBY5\Assets\Menagerie\Source\Menageie_StreetCornerMorning_RigGeo.[ma](https://file.org/extension/ma)`

**ER:** Yeah, [Menagerie](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Menagerie) is different from other sets that we've done for _RWBY_ cuz it's more of a tropical feel so you get kind of a warmer, more vibrant color palette to play around with. You can tell there's a rich culture to this community in Menagerie. So, you really want that to come through with the lighting and the colors that are available to you. 

**AJ:** Honestly through lighting you really want people not to notice. You want them to be engaged in the environment and not really think about the 3D or anything that's involved. Just want it to be immersive.


	6. 1:E6 - Skin and Bones

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Source: https://roosterteeth.com/episode/crwby-behind-the-episode-1-skin-and-bones
> 
> [Tim Reed](https://twitter.com/reeddtim?lang=en) (Lead Character Modeler), [Alex Juarez](https://twitter.com/alexaendros?lang=en) (Modeler), [Sean Stephenson](https://twitter.com/StephensonPSean) (Lead Rigging Artist), [Gio Coutinho](https://twitter.com/giofcoutinho?lang=en) (Lead Rigging Artist)

**TR:** Okay so whenever we start modelling a character, Concept provides us with a concept of the character. And this is [Vernal's](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Vernal) concept right there. They give us all the different views of the character - front, side, back - as well as the scale reference that you can see over here. And once we have all that we start to model. So, every character starts off with a base head so we kind of have a starting point for everybody. But then we just take that, and we shape it into what looks like the concept, and we match the concept as close as possible. This is like the finished the model with textures. Of course, we don't have textures when we first start modelling so, normally it looks more like... this... when we're working on it. So, you can see all the definitional cuts [?] of the model here, differently wrinkles, and basically the rule of thumb is if it catches light then we model it in. And we use what's called creases to hold the smoothing into specific shapes where we need it to. After the model's done we go on and we do the texture, which, turn textures on, and it's that. And if you're into modeling you know what a texture is, but it's basically the color that is put on to the geometry. To get the linework you see in the show we go into 3ds Max and we use a software called Pencil+. Pencil+ does all the cel shading for us and the linework that you see. It basically is the same model, brought into max, with just a few settings applied we can get it pretty close to what you see in the show. Which is... that. You can see here she's got her cel shading on, with default lighting, the black lines are drawn up. And yeah, she's pretty much ready to go.

`Autodesk Maya 2017: D\Projects\RWBY5\_Assets\Vernal\Source\Vernal_RigGeo.ma`  
`Autodesk 3ds Max 2017 Vernal_Pencil.max`

**AJ** : We usually, as we're doing this, talk to Rigging to make sure that certain if they're articles of clothing or if the character has armor pieces, that they're able to either deform properly or if they're not supposed to deform maybe we have to build them in certain ways.

**SS** : In the pipeline we're between Modeling and Animation. So, we pretty much take the models that the Modelling team makes, and we make them animatable. So, like how people and animal, any living being has skeletons, we add joints to these characters.

**GC:** So, when we get a model from Modelling it's not really animation-friendly. Our job is to put in the skeleton on the character and make it so that Animation can do their job. So, here's the skeleton for Vernal. We need to place each of these bones where they should go, like, accurately on their bodies. So, you can see here the wireframe for the elbow. The elbow bone lines up pretty well with the back of the elbow. And you have the wrist, and you have all the hand and joints. Once we have these bones placed, we have a very nifty tool that we can run, and it creates the biped rig. Once we have the autorig down we can start working on skinning, which is the process of actually giving the character the ability to move. Because as you can see right now, the rig is moving, and the controls are moving, but the character isn't actually doing anything. So, to do that we grab the skeleton and we grab the meshes that we want, select everything, go into [Rigging, Skin, and Bind Skin](https://knowledge.autodesk.com/support/maya/learn-explore/caas/CloudHelp/cloudhelp/2018/ENU/Maya-CharacterAnimation/files/GUID-CF2C698A-44BB-4CA0-BCB9-DB36500DA812-htm.html). And now you can see that I can move these controls around and her elbow looks very messed up. So after probably a few hours of work, we get a more final version of the rig that actually moves in a way that feels a lot more natural. You can see that the elbow actually bends without causing weird bumps. Another very big part of the rigging process is actually rigging the character's face. So, for _RWBY_ we went with the blunt-shape face rig. And all of these new meshes that you see on the screen are responsible for giving the characters their expressions. So, this is the A-shape, that's the left blink, that's the right blink. And the face rig puts all of these together into something that animators can actually animate with. So, they'll move these controls around, and now the characters have actually expressions.

**SS** : The relationship between Modelling and Rigging is really, really close here at Rooster Teeth. We have to work together every day to make sure the models are made in a way that the rig can do what it needs to do. And anytime they have a request from us we get it done soon as possible, and the same goes the other way. The show wouldn't be what it is without.


	7. 1:E7 - The Perfect Shot

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Source: <https://roosterteeth.com/episode/crwby-behind-the-episode-1-7>
> 
> [Rachel Doda](https://twitter.com/Rami_Doda) (Camera and Layout Artist), [Ethan Marler](https://twitter.com/ethanmarler) (Camera and Layout Artist), [Kate Warner](https://twitter.com/katyebug) (Camera and Layout Artist)

**RD** : So what we'll do is we'll get all the pre-production assets, the storyboards, the animatic, the motion capture, and essentially what we'll do is we'll look at the animatic and say 'okay, this is the general feel that we're going with the cameras, and we're going with the acting and the scene, so how can we put the character in the best light possible? How can we get a reaction from the audience with the way the camera is placed whether it's up high, low, to the side, is there a movement in there, is there any way that we can do like an action to help heighten the comedy or to even help heighten the drama?'

**EM** : We always use [Maya](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autodesk_Maya) and when we set up the original file with like the animatics and the mocap footage that's all in [Premiere](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adobe_Premiere_Pro). We put up like the audio tracks, and then we put that into Maya, where we sync the [mocap](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motion_capture) with like the character data and that's when we put in all the sets and all the props and characters and everything that's going to be in the scene, eventually.

**KW** : So this is what a finished [master](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Master_shot) looks like, once all of the mocap has been transferred, the audio has been synced up, the set is come in and it's been dressed. We bring in all the other characters, all the assets had to be brought in, all the chopsticks had to be brought in, individually. So once we get everything in place we will get into the [Trax Editor](https://knowledge.autodesk.com/support/maya/downloads/caas/CloudHelp/cloudhelp/2018/ENU/Maya-Animation/files/GUID-33C829F4-635C-4DEB-956C-6A54BEE1EC89-htm.html). We bring in the master file that came in with the mocap so it's the exact same length, it has both takes of the mocap in there, we like to leave everything in just in case the animators need to go and pull data from an earlier or later take. So, this first shot is from 6:20 to 6:59. We'll adjust our frame range to reflect that. And then we'll go in and we'll start setting the camera. So for this one we're going to start with this shot here, which is going to be behind [Yang](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Yang_Xiao_Long) getting everybody's reactions, her kind of flexing, and showing off, then we have this nice long pan of everybody, and that's about where that take ends. So, we have a rough idea of how to set up our shots. So, we're going to play around with our [focal lengths](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Focal_length) until we get it about right. in pre-layout we try to get about 70% with our cameras, before they go to Animation. I mean that's why we have a camera department, come back, and fill in that extra 30% and really give the camera some love. But, just kind of blocking them out. And we just move on. So on down the line, like that. We go through a review process with [Kerry](https://rwby.wikia.com/wiki/Kerry_Shawcross), usually leave all of our shots in the master until he approves them, and then we start the process of actually cutting them up and shipping them off to Animation. And then they work through it and then it comes back to us for final camera.

**RD** : General philosophy with designing shots is essentially how can I tell this story in the clearest way possible via the cameras? Because the audience's eye is always searching, going back and forth, right and left, and you kind of want the eye to feel camera in viewing the images in a sequence. Sometimes the philosophy with the shot is whether I think it looks good as [GIF](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GIF) or not, whether it's something I think friends will want to share on social media or even just like with their friends, like, _'ah look at this cool clip, look at what the camera does here_ '. Essentially with the camera I do my best to try to make sure it's entertaining.


	8. 1:E8 - The Complete Package

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Source: <https://roosterteeth.com/episode/crwby-behind-the-episode-1-the-complete-package>
> 
> [Alex Leonard](https://twitter.com/DWNLDBLCNTNT) (Compositor), [Brett Harding](https://roosterteeth.fandom.com/wiki/Brett_Harding) (Compositor), [Zane Rutledge](https://twitter.com/rzanerutledge) (Lead Compositor)

**AL** : Comp essentially takes all the layers, all the character passes, the environment, sky, the effects, we take all those and manipulate them individually and then slice all those layers back together and render it into a single picture.

**BH** : When a shot is ready to work on, we take the renders from Lighting and we have a set-up script and it's constantly being changed and modified, so we create a template for every scene that has sort like a look that's pre-build into it. And from there we go in and we do our color-correction, we do our depth passes, we make it look like a finished shot. We have to do a lot of clean-up, we have to do a lot of tracing out, which we call [rotoscoping](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rotoscoping), [traveling mattes](http://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/oi/authority.20110803105513257), and, yeah, I don't know, it gets pretty complex.

**AL** : It's interesting because the different scenes are just so different. We've got stuff like shadowy alleys, and then daylight, lot of like [god rays](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crepuscular_rays), and really just high contrast, early-morning shots, so, we're kind of running the gamut on this one.

**BH** : So, setting up the scene templates for [Chapter 8](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Alone_Together), basically Zane had this rough starting point and then I had to go in and kind of check it for robustness, use different shots to set it up with different elements and see what's missing, and what can be improved. We had to make a lot of custom effect so that things set up right with the script.

**ZR** : We use [Adobe After Effects](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adobe_After_Effects) for compositing and this is a fairly typical shot. Little more complicated than some of the simpler shots, and you can see we've got almost 30 layers active in this shot. But if I was to go into the character herself, let's look at [Weiss](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Weiss_Schnee) in this example. This is a fairly typical setup for the character herself. You can see the overall character, flat, and the BA ( _ph._ ) layer. This is Zone 1, which is the dark side of Weiss. So just the dark colors. Then just the light colors, Zone 2. This season we actually introduced a Zone 3 which is at play in this shot with the light coming in the window, it's an additive shot we actually introduced it with the [Weiss trailer](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bZAS_rzgCE0). It also is really handy when you have fire effects, or muscle blasts, or things like that, it's adding kind of a nice additive look. We boost the whites of their eyes like that, and then, let's see, here's the line layer, a little easier to see like that. And finally, the glints in her eyes which are these little, tinier dots, and then you add all those together, and you get Weiss. So, when you're looking at the top level, you're seeing 25 different comp layers, but considering each of the character layers, each of their weapons, is another eight to ten layers, really, you're looking at the potential for hundreds of layers in a typical _RWBY_ shot.

**AL** : Because everything is so all over the place, I hope that everyone just kind of understands the journey that, at least visually, what we're going for. We're in two or three different cities at a time, different times of day, and we sell that well-enough.


	9. 1:E9 - Can You Hear Me Now?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Source: <https://roosterteeth.com/episode/crwby-behind-the-episode-1-can-you-hear-me-now>
> 
> [Chris Kokkinos](https://twitter.com/christhefer) (Lead Sound Designer), [Alena Lecorchick](https://twitter.com/alenalecorchick) (Sound Designer), [David Levy](https://twitter.com/davidlevymusic) (Re-Recording Mix Engineer)

**CK** : The workflow for audio spans from the beginnings of production all the way through post-production. What that means is we record and edit dialogue at the very beginning, after we've gotten the scripts, then we pass it off to departments to work their magics. Once we've received the episodes from the other departments, we then take it into sound design where we'll go in and create the sound effects for every element in the episode. That spans from the ambiences, through the Foley, even the more intricate things like the otherworldly creatures or weapons. After that's done, we pass it off to Mix where we'll then balance all the levels and make sure that the episode sounds good. From dialogue, to sound, to music.

**AL** : So many of the scenes of _RWBY_ , especially dialogue-heavy scenes, comes with a small little action such as shifting around where they're sitting, or picking up a class, or even just patting somebody on the shoulder. They’re very small movements, but each of those make a sound. And we'll recreate those sounds during the Foley process. So, one of us will actually go into the booth and either do a hand tap or pick up glasses, or really whatever the scene requires to recreate those sounds and make it sound very natural into the environment itself. It really does help sell the environment to me, and it's just a little extra layer that you might not notice, but you will probably notice if it wasn't there.

So, what we're doing here is we're doing Foley. We're about to make the sound for [Raven](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Raven_Branwen) sharpening [her sword](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Raven%27s_Sword) with a whetstone. So how we do this, we have the movie on screen, Chris is in the other room, and he is controlling it for me. And then I'm just over and I'm going to sync it to picture. If anyone's wondering, the bandana's shoved in here because I needed the pipe to stop ringing. But I needed a solid metal sound, and that's how it worked.

**CK** : So, the mixing process starts of with the dialogue. First David'll grab the dialogue and he'll clean it all up to make sure it sounds nice and pristine. Then he'll start to layer on the various plugins that we use to make it pop.

**DL** : This is the first time that we've had to mix _RWBY_ in-house. And we have to built it from the ground-up. So, first step is to get the raw audio files and, once we get those in, we go in and clean-up clicks and pops, whatever it is that needs to be cleaned up, and make sure it's nice and clean. Once we're done with that the second step is to bring in our templates that we've made. And the templates are composed of different plug-ins. And each character has specific set up plugins, and specific set of settings that applies only to that character. We do use the same plugins more or less overall, but they change dramatically from character to character because the voices sound so different. So, you can take Raven's voice here... this is only [EQ](https://www.izotope.com/en/products/mix/neutron/features-and-comparison/equalizer.html), and it's going through a bunch of things. We Bypass it. It's probably hard to hear it over the speaker but it has a lot of low end in it that had to be cleaned out. And after that I use this analogue-type EQ. Adds a lot of my saturation of cutting things out again, kind of molding it, to sound nice and natural. And I Bypass everything. Sounds a lot weaker. That's going to go into other plugins and other chains, and it's going to get processed until it sounds exactly the way it needs to sound. For example, here, we have her [Raven] talking through the mask. So, we had to create like a special filter for that, and taking out a ton of frequencies. You can hear the difference between this and, for example, here when she doesn't have the mask. So, it's a little creative little thing we had to do to make it sound more realistic. She has something right in front of her face, mouth. That's kind of the gist of it. It's very basic, without getting too nerdy.

`OBS`   
`Edit: RWBY6_EP09_Master_20171129`   
`Neutron Equalizer`   
`VEQ4`

**CK** : It's been very interesting for us to learn together as we work on this season. And we're incredibly thankful for you guys for watching and giving us your feedback, and your thoughts on how the episodes have been sounding all season. It's been a wild wide and we're really excited for you all to see the rest of the season.


	10. 1:E10 - The One Two Punch

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Source: <https://roosterteeth.com/episode/crwby-behind-the-episode-1-the-one-two-punch>
> 
> [Joel Mann](https://twitter.com/spacedmann) (Lead Animator), [Kim Newman](https://twitter.com/kimboslasher) (Assistant Lead Animator), [Millivette Gonzalez](https://twitter.com/millivette) (Animator)

**JM** : Fight scenes are a beast of their own. Typically for talking head scenes you’ll have like between one to maybe four animators on a scene, and you know, usually that’ll take about a week’s worth of work, depending on how long it is. For a fight, depending on the length of it, we usually have anywhere between three sometime even five animators working four to six weeks on a fight, because unlike, you know, a talking head scene, there’s a lot more back-and-forth between all the different departments to get the final look that we need.

**KW** : For fight animation the first thing we do is we get the animatics. From there we start planning out on how we want to tackle each part of the fight. So, it’s not just you know fully mo-cap or hand-keyed animation, it’s planning out, okay, what can I use from the extensive library that we have, what can I motion capture on my own, will I need someone else to, you know, go through the motions with me?

**MG** : [The chapter 10 fight](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Battle_Pages/Belladonna_Household_vs._White_Fang) is huge. You have a lot of parts to it. [Blake](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Blake_Belladonna) and [Ilia](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Ilia_Amitola) going all-out against each other. The parts where Ilia is starting to break a little bit and can’t really fight with Blake. And it was really interesting too because it’s also the first time where you’re really seeing [Ghira](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Ghira_Belladonna) and [Corsac](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Corsac_Albain) and [Fennec](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Fennec_Albain) fighting, so it was about figuring out what they’re fighting style is, how they use their weapons. It’s been really challenging just to plan for it, and to try to get something that, you know, is cool, makes sense, and is also not too overwhelming. Because we still have a lot more stuff in the season that’s going to be happening.

**KW** : So today I’m going to talk to you about my process of how I did the Sun vs. Ilia [gunchuck](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Ruyi_Bang_and_Jingu_Bang) sequence. So, the first step that I did was I blocked out Sun’s basic actions, trying to make sure they all flowed and worked together. I also put in a basic camera in there as well, making sure that his actions kind of flowed between shots, and everything was working out nicely. So, once I was happy with what Sun was doing, nothing is polished yet, I add Ilia to the scene. Kind of just blocking out her basic actions as well. It changed a few things, from, you know, the blocking stage to the final version. She doesn’t do, you know, flips in certain spots, and when she gets hit here it’s changed a little bit. Once I was happy with the overall basic actions, I do a polish pass on two characters. You can see that these are proxy models that we have here. The yellow one is Sun, of course, and the brown one is Ilia. And they’re just going through their actions. I’m happy with everything that’s happening in here, the swords are contracting properly, the weight feels good, you know, there’s slow mo, I’ve polished my camera. And once I’m happy with all the basic actions I put the real models into Maya. So here I have Ilia’s model in here, and I’m working on her hair, making sure that’s animated, getting facial expressions, working on the hand poses, any kind of thing that wasn’t on the base model. And once I had Ilia the way I liked her I also did the same for Sun, so, I have his tail animated, the chain on his pants, his shirt, his hair, his necklace is now moving as well. He has lots of facial expressions, he’s reacting to everything that is happening in the sequence. From here once I am happy with the two characters, I start adding 2D effects cards into my scenes, so like the hit right there is just a flat plane with an animated card going across it. And I only have the final asset for [Ilia’s weapon](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Ilia%27s_Weapon) in here, and there’s more effects. I also added some, you can see right here, the bullet casings from Sun’s gunchucks. And yeah, that’s basically the whole process for doing a fight scene.

`Autodesk Maya 2017: D:\_Projects\RWBY5\_Chapter_000\000000\000000_70068\Animate_000000_70068.ma --- Camera_000:Shot Camera`

**JM** : So, the fight in [chapter 10](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/True_Colors) definitely kind of kicks off some new things that are happening for the rest of the season. It’s definitely an interesting fight from the perspective of it’s a giant climactic battle between Blake and Ilia, and while there’s a lot of cool fight stuff in there, there’s also a lot of emotional intensity going on. Blake and Ilia have kind of been at odds at each other for about two seasons now, and it’s kind of cool to see how that kind of comes into fruition. This fight also has a lot of effects that we’re trying for the first time. We’re burning a building down, and we’re shattering balconies, we’re freezing swords, there’s a lot of really cool stuff that’s going on that we haven’t really attempted before, and it’s really cool to see how it’s turning out.


	11. 1:E11 - Drawing Inspiration

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Source: <https://roosterteeth.com/episode/crwby-behind-the-episode-1-drawing-inspiration>
> 
> [Patrick Rodriguez](https://twitter.com/patthewanderer) (Art Director), [Erin Winn](https://twitter.com/erinmwinn) (Production Artist), [Sana Freeman](https://twitter.com/sanafreemanart) (Production Artist)

**PR** : Our process for concept is first we have to have the writers write something, and once we have that, we can get a general idea of direction from the director. And we’ll take that and any of his information he gives us, and we’ll do several different iterations of a certain task. For characters it’s usually a bit more, while environments typically don’t take as many. From there we just make a rough, and when we’ve finalized the actual look, we’ll do a turnaround, and we’ll send it on over to Modeling for finishing and actually creating the character in 3D.

**EW** : The amount of references [Kerry](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Kerry_Shawcross) gives us depends on what he has in mind. Sometimes he’ll have a very good idea of what he wants, and he’ll list out some ideas like, oh, ‘I want this character to be this high, or this tall, and they have this kind of hair’. Or some other times he’ll be a bit more broad, and he’ll give us a lot more freedom to play around. 

**SF** : Usually when I talk to [Kerry](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm4210310/) it always starts with layout, and we ask, like, ‘Kerry what do you imagine like this layout to look like’ and he’ll do a very terrible drawing on the whiteboard. After that it’s just a lot of back and forth. Technically there’s a lot of different demands between like a fight set and a set where characters will just be talking. But when it comes to actually designing the environment those things aren’t super considered that much, except space, like if a fight’s supposed to take place somewhere where they want to make big.

**PR** : The most difficult thing of concept is usually weapons, because they’re super super involved. We like to keep the old imagery, and what we’ve kept throughout seasons are transforming weapons, and applying that to a 2D image is a little bit harder. Because what [Monty](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monty_Oum) used to do was he’d take just random pieces and build it all himself in 3D. So, he wouldn’t have much of a concept phase. All of his concepts was done in Animation, and just pieces he would take and transform. Whereas Concepts is we have to have this whole pipeline and explain this all the way through. Sometimes it’s not as fantastical at the beginning. It’ll end up looking really cool in the end but in the beginning in Concept it’s super like kind of abstract. Well it’s going to be this in Stage 1, this is Stage 2, and then this is Stage 3.

**EW** : [Leo’s weapon](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Leonardo%27s_Weapon) was basically talking to Kerry about what he had in mind. Went back and forth a lot about his fighting style. He mentioned he wanted sort of a revolving shield on his wrist that would emit Dust in some way. And we just kind of took it from there. A lot of [Leo’s](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Leonardo_Lionheart) visuals and his overall outfit influence the weapons greatly. It has a lot of the same color palettes, motifs, and design elements throughout the weapon.

**SF** : Generally in _RWBY_ everyone’s focused on the characters, like, almost 100% of the time, so the environments, I almost don’t want them to notice them as much, because I want them to be immersed in this world that’s just colorful and it’s pretty and like you almost don’t even think about it because the characters just go in so well. 

**PR** : There’s little details to put into everything, and hopefully people catch it. If they don’t, then, it’s whatever. But as long as it reaches towards an ultimate goal, like, oh that’s cool, or oh I want to cosplay that. Like cosplaying is one of the biggest things that we love seeing, just because we get to finally see these characters in real life, and just see the fans live loving the hell out of it.


	12. 1:E12 - The Pen and The Sword

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Source: <https://roosterteeth.com/episode/crwby-behind-the-episode-1-the-pen-and-the-sword>
> 
> [Kevin Harger](https://roosterteeth.fandom.com/wiki/Kevin_Harger) (Storyboard Artist), [Connor Pickens](https://twitter.com/condorpickens) (Lead Editor)

**KH** : Storyboarding is a really exciting process because nothing has been taken from the words to images yet. And so, I get the privilege of interpreting what the writer has written. The beginning of storyboarding a scene, the director and I will get together, sit down with the script, read it through, talk about what images he has in his head, take them, and talk about different camera styles, talk about specific angles and depth of field, and stuff that he wants to do with the camera. And kind of what the major story beats are. From there I take the script back to my desk and start sketching out some thumbnails. We do a lot of really small, quick sketches to try to hit all the major beats of the scene, and see if we can communicate this in an efficient way using as few drawings as possible. I show that to the director, and we talk about what’s working, and what’s not. And from there I’ll take those thumbnail drawings and start to clean them up, add a lot of beats in-between to give motion and energy to the story, and from there I hand the boards off to Editorial, and they put together an animatic form.

**CP** : So, the start of our job in Editorial is really, we get the storyboards and we get the dialogue, and we go through and cut the animatics, which is basically we take the storyboards into Premiere, we lay them out in a timeline. We do kind of a timing pass prior to bringing the dialogue in, and we add the dialogue and readjust to match that. We bring in the sound effects and music, and anything else that’s important to conveying what’s going on in the scene. And then we export that, and we send it out to the team to start watching.

Editing with [Kerry](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qrbnvtFkUMk) is interesting. It kind of depends on how much time we have. Sometimes we have to move pretty quickly through the scenes, but in the best-case scenario we get to sit down and play around with different ideas about how the scene could be cut. A lot of kind of the options are set before we get started by his work with the storyboard artist. So, we come in with a close-up here, a wide shot here, but we can go through and kid of reorder that and say, ‘yeah, originally this sequence was supposed to start in a wide shot and then move into closeups, and then go into a POV shot over here. But now that we’re looking at it cut together, it actually would feel a bit better if we end this scene on a wide shot, so lets just start close up and then, you know, shift that around’. Editing for the most part is kind of throwing a lot at the wall and seeing what sticks.

**KH** : I think every storyboard artist brings their own visual experiences and brings those to their work, and so it’s kind of what’s exciting for a director to work with new storyboard artists. They can get different ideas, and things that they just never would’ve thought of, and that collaboration will become something new and exciting.

**CP** : The editing is not something that you want to draw a lot of attention to. Really the goal is for it to kind of blend into the background. You just want to tell the story as well as you can, and you want the audience to just be so absorbed with what’s happening and the story being told that they’re not thinking about the craft. And that goes from Animation to Cameras to Editing for the most part. Everything should be focused in and guiding you towards the intent of the show.


	13. 1:E13 - No Technical Difficulties

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Source: <https://roosterteeth.com/episode/crwby-behind-the-episode-1-no-technical-difficulties>
> 
> [Eric Turman](https://roosterteeth.com/user/Eric.Turman) (Supervising Technical Director), [Brian Mumm](https://twitter.com/TheMummZone) (Lead Software Engineer), [Tony Salvaggio](https://twitter.com/chojinlocke) (Pipeline Technical Director)

**ET** : Tech basically handles all pipeline requirements for getting the production from concept to completion. Make sure that the artists can concentrate not on the technical issues but on their craft so that viewers get the best experience. We’ve got three basic branches to the team. So, we have our hardware for all computers, we’ve got the [QA](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quality_assurance) department which includes the pipeline direction, making sure that production goes smoothly, and then we have our software development team where we create the tools, custom tools, they use to push the data through the pipe.

**BM** : Mainly we program in [Python](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Python_\(programming_language\)) and we create all kinds of different tools to either, like, speed the artists’ workflow up or we create automation for them. So, we have [Max](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autodesk_3ds_Max) and [Maya](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autodesk_Maya) in our pipeline. So Max does our lines, we do all our rendering in Maya. So, we handle the bridge between those two packages, and handling the complexities with that. 

**TS** : A lot of what I do is kind of focus on what the animators or comp team, lighting team, etcetera, needs, and then it’s up to me to make sure that that’s communicate to the rest of the department. Having that kind of expertise, I go ‘ _well Animation needs it this way_ ’, and Programming will go ‘ _well that’s not as efficient, why do they need it?_ ’. And I’m kind of between that, and we find that middle ground. And then day-to-day just troubleshooting. 

**BM** : Tech has a broader perspective on the production, so we work with all the different teams, which is quite nice. So, we kind of know what’s going on, at a lot. So, there’s a lot of communication that actually goes through tech, and we kind of send that out as well. We have pretty close relationships with almost all the teams, which is fantastic, because you get to meet like so many creative people, and people with just a lot of skill.

**TS** : You’re constantly on the lookout for how to help the production be faster, more efficient. Or: I think that if we do this, it will look _x_ amount more beautiful because we have these different shaders that we’re examining, or this helps a scene be bigger because we’ve made it so efficient now we can have expansive sets.

**ET** : One of the big areas that we worked on was the post department, and lighting, and specific making sure that we were able to get a wraparound on new technology called [Pencil+](https://www.psoft.co.jp/en/product/pencil/3dsmax/), which utilizes Max as a renderer, and we’ve been using Maya for our animation, so bringing those two together, and having renders that look identical between Max and Maya, but getting the line sets out of Max. Over on to Comp, which is past lighting, we have tools that automatically bring the rendered images together and do the quick comp set-up for them to reduce the errors and let them get on to actual creation of their art.

**BM** : We move the needle forward but it’s also kind of a give and pull, so like, the art inspires the tech, but the tech also inspires the art, so, that’s one thing that I always take great joy into is actually seeing the final episode and everything, it really kind of inspires the team, and it’s like ‘ _oh my gosh that looks so amazing_ ’, you know, especially after seeing it in the early steps, or if we’re debugging a problem, or something like that, it’s a lot of fun.


	14. 1:E14 – Fanfare

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Source: <https://roosterteeth.com/episode/crwby-behind-the-episode-1-fanfare>
> 
> [Miles Luna](https://twitter.com/drunkmilesluna) (Writer/Co-Director), [Kerry Shawcross](https://twitter.com/kerryshawcross) (Writer/Director)

[Neptune cosplayer]: I’ve been here since the first _RWBY_ panel, so every year since then I’ve come and I’ve never actually cosplayed, so this year, I decided, hey me and my brother, we should come together as partners, so we chose [Neptune](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Neptune_Vasilias) and [Sun](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Sun_Wukong), and we’re like, hey, be the best.

[Yang cosplayer]: I love the show, I’ve been watching it, I’ve always been excited with it. It’s just every year, it just gets better and better. So that wants me to just cosplay, and plus each character you feel like you can relate to each one of the characters, like I relate to [Yang](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Yang_Xiao_Long), and that’s why I like cosplaying as her.

[Penny cosplayer]: I think because it’s such a nice show, in how the interact with fans, they let characters… design costumes for the characters, and everything else, I think it really gets in touch with the fans, makes fans really enjoy being a part of _RWBY_.

**ML** : From a motivational standpoint, the fans have been… _irreplaceable_. From the moment we put up [the “Red” Trailer](http://youtube.com/watch?v=pYW2GmHB5xs) we immediately started seeing fanart and speculation and it’s this weird sort of fuel that on a really late night, if you’re at the office, and you’re tired, and you’re asking yourself ‘ _why the hell am I killing myself in order to make this thing?_ ’, you just have to go to like [reddit](https://www.reddit.com/r/RWBY) or [Tumblr](https://www.tumblr.com/tagged/rwby) or [Twitter](https://twitter.com/hashtag/rwby?lang=en) and you go ‘ _oh yeah, that’s why_ ’.

**KS** : The fans definitely have an influence on the show. A lot of the feedback that they give us throughout the season we’ll kind of use that to try and apply to the next season. We definitely listen to everything, trust me, _everything_. Finding out what people like about the show, finding out what people don’t like about the show, I think we get a lot more immediate feedback than most other shows, especially cable, we’re able to evolve, throughout the seasons of the show, other shows we can work on. We also make sure it’s true to what we want to do. But more often than not we’ll get feedback from the fans and go ‘ _yeah that makes sense_ ’. And, you know, just try to apply that going forward.

**ML** : Obviously you know when we go to tell a story we want to have some kind of impact on people, but the passion and the excitement that people have brought is, it’s just ridiculous. You know we’ve done contests in the past to see people create you know, outfit designs for [Velvet](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Velvet_Scarlatina). [Team NDGO](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/NDGO) was an entirely fan-created team that worked with myself, Kerry and Patrick Rodriguez to help come up with character designs and backstories and all that stuff. But even in like little details, like the names of some of the Team Attacks that [Team RWBY](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/RWBY_\(team\)) uses are based off of [ship names](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1_bnr68pepImz1RDq7uJiQraVnDjU2D0vqmrSE85sF_U/), because we just thought that that was adorable and hilarious.

**KS** : From day one people were cosplaying and doing fanart and spreading the word about the show. And it means the world to us, and it really is why we’re here, where we are right now. It’s just a bunch of people in a building just trying to make cool things and because people can tell that we care, and then that makes them care more. I think it’s awesome that people not only care enough about the show, but care about the people working on the show, as well, whether it’s Miles and I working on scripts, or animators, or modellers, or anybody, there’s a hardcore group of fans that you know follow everybody that works on the show. I think that’s awesome, and I think that’s something that doesn’t really happen in many other places and I think that’s really cool.

**ML** : We never imagined things would get this wild and this crazy and we’re trying to have as much fun as possible and we hope that you’re having fun watching too. Whether it be laughing or crying or sitting at the edge of your seat, or just dreaming up your own [fanfiction](https://archiveofourown.org/tags/RWBY/works) or [character](https://www.deviantart.com/tag/rwbyoc)… _thanks_. It’s pretty cool.

_Written, directed, music by[Richard Norman](https://twitter.com/TheManThatAte)_


	15. 2:E1 - Among the Crowds

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Source: <https://roosterteeth.com/episode/crwby-behind-the-episode-2-among-the-crowds>
> 
> [Brett Johnson](https://roosterteeth.fandom.com/wiki/Brett_Johnson) (Lead Environment Modeler), [Mark Vearrier](https://roosterteeth.fandom.com/wiki/Mark_Vearrier) (Lighting Artist), [Jacob Hilton](https://roosterteeth.fandom.com/wiki/Jacob_Hilton) (Lead Crowds Artist), [Daniel Gerstner](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm10376719/) (Lighting Artist)

* * *

**BJ** : In Season 5 of _RWBY_ there was a lot of stuff going on. And they wanted to go off of Season 5 into Season 6 with a really big bang so to speak.

**MV** : It's always good to solve a problem. Y'know our job is problem solving. If it were easy everyone would be doing it, y'know. So, when we solve something and it works and it looks great, that's awesome.

**JH** : Previously we had done a lot of work with [Golaem](http://golaem.com/) which is a plug-in for Maya. And for this season we had moved over to a software called [Houdini](http://www.sidefx.com/docs/houdini/index.html).

**DG** : We can just do so much more. Houdini is just so fast versus Golaem.

**JH:** Crowds is a big focus that we've been working on because we can sell bigger stories. We've got things like train stations, with battles and things like that coming up. And you just can't really sell that kind of work without a lot of people.

_Nora Valkyrie: I can't believe we're taking the train to[Argus](https://rwby.wikia.com/wiki/Argus_Limited/Transcript)._

**MV:** One of the things that we do in our lighting aesthetic is we try to keep things lit fairly front-on like if our camera's here we usually put the light right about here on a consistent basis so people look very clean and we avoid lots of like streaking shadows or cross-faces or broad movements of cast shadows on people's bodies.

**DG:** So right now we're using a distant light in cases where we had the camera shift over a whole bunch we wanna use a point light because these zones need to be consistent across the entire shot.

**JH:** In Episode 1 we had a really big train sequence.

**BJ:**[The train](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Argus_Limited_\(train\)) is so massive, it's just rendering it alone was a technical challenge. And in a game, it'd be very easy, you'd just lock them into place. But with a show like this it's a lot of technical limitations or, how creative can you be with the software that you have.

**MV:** The train was such a special vehicle. The train was an environment inside of an environment. Took a lot of R&D to figure it out, but I think the results look pretty good.

**DG:** It's really, really cool to actually see it all come together.

**JH:** We've got a lot more characters than we've dealt with in the past.

**MV:** I started reading the scripts and see the animatics and I'm like 'okay, that's what's going on with the guy from two seasons back and it comes back in'.

**DG:** I was reading the screenplays so people will look to each other and like 'oh my god this actually happens in this episode, this is going to be crazy'.

**MV:** We got a pretty good mix of some young, fresh people who are just out of school and with some veterans who've got experience doing similar things, and they're _all_ dedicated, _all_ want to do their best and make everything, every frame look as good as they can.

**JH:** It's definitely cool to come in and get to watch a cartoon every day, and then to be a part of making that feel a bit more alive, and to be able to do that with like such amazing people, there's just nothing like it.

**DG:** They're in for I think a wild ride of a season. There's going to be a lot of answers to a lot of questions people have had, and it's going to keep on moving.

MV: It gets better and better every year.

**BJ:** I can't wait to just give back to the fans newer and better things and episodes coming up. And that's what you're going to be seeing in [Episode 1](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Argus_Limited_\(train\)), coming right off the bat.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Further Reading:
> 
> · ["RTX Austin 2018 Panels on Animation & Info About RWBY"](https://archive.fo/m6OCE). [Tumblr](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tumblr). August 18, 2018. Archived from [the original](http://hypeathon.tumblr.com/post/177119867715/rtx-austin-2018-panels-on-animation-info-about) on January 31, 2019.


	16. The Magic of Character Creation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Source: <https://roosterteeth.com/episode/crwby-behind-the-episode-2-magic-of-character-creation>

* * *

> [Erin Winn](https://twitter.com/erinmwinn) (Lead Concept Artist), [Patrick Rodriguez](https://twitter.com/patthewanderer?lang=en) (Art Director), [Ian Kedward](http://roosterteeth.wikia.com/wiki/Ian_Kedward) (Lead Animator), [Ryan Bowden](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm4062095/) (Lead VFX Artist)

**EW:** [Jinn](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Jinn) is special because she's kind of like the first time we're seeing this magical being in present-day _RWBY_ , not quite something we've seen before. She had like a lot of love and care put into here.

_Jinn: Tell me: what knowledge do you seek?_

**PR:**[Episode 2](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Uncovered) for Jinn brings a lot of history to the world. She is a keeper of knowledge.

**IK:** She's not obviously like any character we've seen so far in the entire show. She's literally just something else.

**PR:** Like most other animation stuff we start off with what the writers have given us or what the director has given of the idea, that pure idea of what we're knew we're going to have. But yeah we have a rough start there.

**EW:** It was pretty exciting to get to design probably one of the most important or influential characters in the series so far. She has different body proportions than we're used to seeing in _RWBY_. She's very tall, her face is longer, her neck's longer. So, a lot of her jewelry is kind of influenced by both the statue we saw in Volume 5 but also the lantern. Like this grate is used on her necklace, the loops from the handle are also on her belt, and her earrings up here, and again you can see some on her legs that's also taken from the lantern.

**EW:** Obviously since she's this powerful deity type, all-knowing being, she's always floating, she's always really wispy, and feels light. We get to have some of our animations play a lot more with just the constant ambiance of like her hair, chains, dress, always moving.

**PR:** We wanted to make her look ethereal, of course, and you know like a genie, so you know like surrounding her with smoke, and we wanted to give her a dress. We've put a cone around her, and it emanates smoke to create a formed dress around her waist.

**RB:** Visual effects in this context - it's a lot of magical type effects. Basically, what we get told is: do magic. In this case, in Chapter 2, it was a lot of Jinn smoke. We take the skirt and we roughen the edges up. And then in the simulation we add a lot of [curl noise](http://www.sidefx.com/docs/houdini/nodes/vop/curlnoise.html) and we take the incoming movement from that skirt and we use that as like our general motion. Then there's like another pass of smoke where it's coming from the actual chains and like her jewelry and stuff as well, and that's the yellow-type aura that you kind of see coming from her.

**PR:** Jinn is a culmination of every single department figuring out this one character.

**IK:** It's cool to always get as many different perspectives on anything you can as much as possible.

**PR:** Episodes like this really bring out the creative in everybody here. We want to make something that gives the fans something to be in awe of. And it's something that we're very proud of at the end of the day.


	17. Art of the Gods

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Source: <https://roosterteeth.com/episode/crwby-behind-the-episode-2-art-of-the-gods>

* * *

> [Weston T. Jones](https://twitter.com/westontjones?lang=en) (Environment Designer), [Erin Winn](https://twitter.com/erinmwinn?lang=en) (Lead Concept Artist), [Ian Kedward](http://roosterteeth.wikia.com/wiki/Ian_Kedward) (Lead Animator), [Gio Coutinho](https://twitter.com/giofcoutinho?lang=en) (Lead Rigging Artist)

**WJ:** So this only [Episode 3 of the Season](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/The_Lost_Fable) and it's an absolutely massive effort. We get to see culture we haven't seen before, people we haven't seen before.

**EW:** Chapter 3 we're introduced to the Gods. This is where the story really started.

**IK:**[God of Light](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/God_of_Light) is, styled after more [Eastern Dragon](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_dragon), like very long, and snake-like. But then [God of Darkness](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/God_of_Darkness) is very [Western-styled](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_dragon). Big, beefy.

**EW:** We give the concept to modelling, they'll model it to the needs of the riggers, who then add basically the inner skeleton of the characters.

**GC:** So I'll go over the transformation for the God of Darkness right now. If you take a look at this video, you'll see that as the dragon walks forward, his horns start to grow, his tail comes out from his human body. There's a God of Darkness rig which is completely human. There's a God of Darkness transformation rig - it's the in-between phase between human and dragon. And he has extra things such as the wings, spine spikes, muscles that grow as a blend shape. His horn transformation, it kind of feels like it's growing out of his head. His tail is very interesting to rig. I gave animation an attribute to push it in, so by reversing this push-in effect, they can make it come out. And then we have the God of Darkness dragon asset. To get that set up for animation we have our quadruped autorig. We place the skeleton, making sure that the bones reflect the inaccurate position. The God of Light, he's a long boi. There's a lot of controls because he just has a lot of things that you need to be able to move, like the tip of his tail. And this is some animation magic that they put together, like, we give them these attributes and they're the ones who really bring it to life.

**IK:** God of Darkness, oh man, the animator who got to animate him coming out of the sludge, we told him: ' _this is our Big Reveal_ ’. He is creepy, weird, he's like super drooped-over all of his muscles are like pushed super far, his spine is completely curved, he has all these whipping arm motions, and head motions. He did a great job.

**WJ:** You've got the character-creature design, you've got rigging to make sure all of that transformation stuff works, environment and modeling to build sets that these characters come with.

**GC:** We've learned a lot, and we've done a lot of new things that have allowed us to really grow as a team.

**WJ:** We got around to answering a whole bunch of questions that fans have been asking for a long time. And now we can just keep barreling forward and start delving into new stuff.


	18. A Touch of Evil

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Source: <https://roosterteeth.com/episode/crwby-behind-the-episode-2-a-touch-of-evil>

* * *

> [Connor Pickens](https://twitter.com/condorpickens) (Co-Director), [Eddy Rivas](https://twitter.com/eddyrivas) (Animation Department Writer), [Paula Decanini](https://twitter.com/pauladecanini?lang=en) (Lead Animator), [Melanie Stern](https://twitter.com/melsternum) (Assistant Lead Animator)

**CP** : [Volume 6 Episode] [3](https://roosterteeth.com/episode/rwby-volume-6-3) is just this kind of immense, like, journey across time and space. Chapter 4 is kind of picking up from there, and bringing it down to something nice and intimate.

 **ER** : It's always fun to kind of go from really big and wide and huge and then to go back to small, and to focus in on one thing, you know, and what's the fallout with these people?

_Ruby Rose: Professor? What is your plan to defeat Salem?_

_Ozpin: I don't have one._

**ER** : You know it's that slow boil that's been happening with these characters, they're questioning everything they knew, and now kind of in the muck and trying to figure out where to go and all that starts kind of, spinning in on itself.

 **CP** : On the bad guys we're picking up with, for the first time this season, Emerald, Mercury and Hazel are reporting back to Salem after their own train wreck, which is the [Battle of Haven](https://rwby.wikia.com/wiki/Battle_Pages/Battle_of_Haven). It's really just about showing the terror that they're experiencing, having to report back to their leader, and tell her all the unsavory details about how things went down.

 **ER** : [Inaudible] told me to get the shot of like, what's going on the bad guys' role, and kind of framing things from their point of view. We kind of get a slight, like, different glimpse into what their goals are.

_Salem: Emerald, I want you to tell me whose fault this was?_

**PD** : Like the stiller and more quiet that Salem got, the more you knew, like, danger was coming.

 **MS** : The Salem, she's like my favorite villain to animate, she's so low-key, but being low-key kind of makes her absolutely terrifying.

 **ER** : As a writer it's so fun to watch the episodes. Sometimes the animators take certain things and just run with them, or they take it that extra kind of 25% that really puts it over the top.

 **PD** : We try and really make sure that the eyes express what they need to express. You can play with the pupil shapes, and the iris shapes, and the little [specular glints](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catch_light). You can play with all of that stuff.

 **MS** : This is right after Salem kind of alludes that Cinder is still alive. Until this moment Emerald thought she was dead, and she was distraught. You can see, as soon as Salem starts walking away, Emerald's eyes slowly start to widen 'cuz she's realizing that Cinder is alive, so like just this subtle looking up, and then like small eye darts along with like slowly widening the eyes, I think it has a read even though Emerald's not saying anything yet.

 **CP** : It's about finding the little nuances that are there in the script, and just figuring out the best way to enhance those dynamics.

 **PD** : That's been really satisfying to see that develop. How far we've been able to push the emotional core of the show.

 **ER** : Knowing that all that's there is super exciting for everybody. And knowing that the fans are going to be really excited about it as it continues to drop week to week. It's, you know, an amazing feeling.


	19. See, Think, Do

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Source: <https://roosterteeth.com/episode/crwby-behind-the-episode-2-see-think-do>

* * *

> [Melanie Stern](https://twitter.com/melsternum?lang=en) (Assistant Lead Animator), [Eddy Rivas](https://twitter.com/eddyrivas) (Writer/Brand Archivist), [Paula Decanini](https://twitter.com/pauladecanini?lang=en) (Lead Animator), [Matt Drury](https://twitter.com/mttdrury) (Animator)

**MS** : Neo makes her appearance in Chapter 5. Everyone was kind of like waiting for it, cuz she's been gone since [Volume 3](https://rwby.wikia.com/wiki/Heroes_and_Monsters).

**ER** : Yeah, I'm sure fans aren't going to be excited about that at all, that [Neo](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Neopolitan) is finally back.

**PD** : We don't really know where Neo's been this whole time, but we get the sense that whatever was happening to her, she was leveling up, so to speak, she's definitely stronger, she's faster.

**MD** : And so now that she's back we have to like really own, like, the very first time that we see her, which luckily is [a fight](https://rwby.wikia.com/wiki/Battle_Pages/Cinder_vs._Neopolitan).

_Lil' Miss Malachite: Maybe put away the good glasses._

**MD** : A lot of Neo's like personality comes through her motion. Her motion as a whole is what sells like her as a character.

**PD** : Gosh she's just the funnest character to animate. She has to be a lot more expressive cuz she doesn't speak. So, you have to always make sure her face expressions are reading, her body language is reading.

**MD** : Like you'll see here I have Cinder's mouth open so that like she'll like yell or say something there. But with Neo the whole time she just has a closed mouth. So the best you can get is something like this, where she's like got a snarl of like rage here.

**MS** : What's great about doing fights is each character has a very different weapon.

**PD** : She is really good at deflecting with [her umbrella](https://rwby.wikia.com/wiki/Neopolitan%27s_Umbrella), or dodging punches, or leaping out of the way. And then sneaking around, finding weak spots, and hitting those.

**MS** : In a way like the camera is an actor, too. We get to have a lot of fun with just how it moves with the character and everything. This is right after Cinder pushes herself off [Lil' Miss'](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Lil%27_Miss_Malachite) table. Neo completely goes off-screen, and then the sole focus of the shot is Cinder. And so it kind of like goes up with her, and then comes back down, and the fact that it's kind of like tracking her fist, it really catches your eye, especially when she finally like has that impact with Neo's umbrella.

**MD** : One of the things in fights I like to do is like really do a full pass where the face is going and it's like see think do. I love for like the eyes to look at the weapon, and then them to look up at the person and be like ' _oh they're about to hit me_ '. Cinder looks down at the leg like at the weight shift that Neo's doing, and already has a hand ready to brush away the attack. She sees it, she thinks, and then she does.

**ER** : Fight scenes and action scenes are always like kind of a cool place where you see that mixture of like all the teams kind of inserting their own thing into it. Little moments that you'll look at it and you'll be like ' _oh wow I didn't see that one coming_ ', you know. Or ' _oh wow, that's different than I imagined but like in a way better way_ '.


	20. Apathy Follows

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Source: <https://roosterteeth.com/episode/crwby-behind-the-episode-2-apathy-follows>

* * *

> [Miles Luna](https://twitter.com/TheMilesLuna) (Head Writer of Animation), [Mark Osborne](http://roosterteeth.wikia.com/wiki/Mark_Osborne) (Visual Post Supervisor)

**ML:** I've been super-existed about The Apathy episode for a very long time. The story line for [The Apathy](https://rwby.wikia.com/wiki/Apathy) is one that I've had since before Volume 1, and then Volume 6 came around, and it ended up being the perfect point in the story. We had this enormous revelation about [Oz](https://rwby.wikia.com/wiki/Ozpin) and [Salem](https://rwby.wikia.com/wiki/Salem), and when our characters are confronted with that, they're not in the greatest head-space. Very early on characters keep referring to how tired they are, and they start saying things that might seen a little out-of-character. Suddenly talking about giving up, or just going home, or 'what's the point?'.

_Weiss Schnee: Why are we even going to Atlas?_

**ML** : We're brought to [Brunswick Farms](https://rwby.wikia.com/wiki/Brunswick_Farms) where aside from the fact that nobody's here, it seems fine. There was no struggle, there was no attempt to try to flee or run away. Everyone just died. That right there is the best part because you just keep asking yourself: well but why? Hoping that the characters will learn the answer to that before they themselves succumb to this exact same fate.

**MO** : The characters fall down into kind of the sewer system of the town they're in. That's where they first encounter the Apathy. They're very corpse-like, zombie-like, they move very slowly, but they have probably the strongest Grimm power that we've ever seen, which is to make anybody that's around their vicinity feel apathetic towards everything.

_Ruby Rose: Guys, I..._

**ML** : I like this idea of an enemy that was not physically threatening whatsoever. What was threatening about it was how it made you feel.

**MO** : Since we're underground there's no real source of light. The Apathy are dark, the characters are dark, the environment's dark. So the challenge in this episode is trying to make everything fit into this dark environment, make it feel creepy, making sure the viewer understands the feeling and the mood, but also is able to see. The Apathy do a pulsing eye throll [sp?]. They emit this apathetic energy towards our hero characters.

_Yang Xiao Long: I can't do this._

**ML** : And that's the true danger of The Apathy. It's not that it's going to run up to you and rip you to shreds. It's just going to follow you, and follow you, and follow you, until you no longer feel like taking another step forward. And then it will catch up, and then it will get you.

**MO** : For everyone that's been working on this episode, and seeing how our characters battle through the hard times, believe in themselves, it gives you hope, and makes you happy that you're going to be able to do it, and push it through, and get the episode out, and make it as best you can.

**ML** : I'm always blown away by what the _RWBY_ team is able to put together. They're some of the hardest-working people that I have ever had the pleasure of working with. This whole Volume has been wild, and it's so exciting to finally see this part of the story get told.


	21. The Wonderful World of Merch

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Source: <https://roosterteeth.com/episode/crwby-behind-the-episode-2-the-wonderful-world-of-merch>

* * *

> [Tony Simonetta](https://twitter.com/tony_simonetta/) (Graphic Designer), [Robert Nash](https://roosterteeth.com/user/robert.nash) (Product Merchandiser), [Courtney Brenek](https://twitter.com/courtneybrenek?lang=en) (Graphic Designer - Merch), [Brian Reilly](https://twitter.com/skilltacular?lang=en) (Producer - Board Games)

**TS** : Merch is kind of the most personal thing that you can own because you put it on your body you walk around all day saying that ' _this is what I'm about_ '. And it's kind of just a big part of any fandom. The merch is going to be like how you represent what you love. Designing merch for _RWBY_ can start tons of different ways. Sometimes ideas will spring from the community.

**RN** : So much time was put into the fanart, so you know if someone is creating a drawing for a certain character, you know they love that character, so that helps me say _'Oh hey someone spent hours creating this beautiful portrait of this new character, we should obviously look into doing merch for it as well_ '.

**TS** : You see a lot of it now because _RWBY_ 's just such a global phenomenon. You see it grocery shopping now, it's kind of everywhere, it shows up in different places where you'd least expect it, and that's kind of the most fun thing to encounter.

**CB** : Usually for projects I'm given a prompt and then I come up with multiple ideas and present them to the team, and they decide which one moves forward. I was given the prompt to create a Grimm and a Zwei mug, and then I decided to try doing mugs with feet on them, because I thought that would be really cute. Interestingly for this one I decided the inside of the mug would be red because the inside of a Grimm is usually red. It's really exciting, I didn't know I'd get an opportunity to work on _RWBY_ so closely. Because I'm a fan too, so a lot of it is also stuff that I want to see, too.

**BR** : We've also expanded into games. So we have _[RWBY: Amity Arena](https://www.reddit.com/r/RWBYAmityArena/)_ , it's a mobile game. The characters come to life right there in your hand, and they attack each other, first one to take down the other person's towers wins. You can form schools within the game, and kind of team up, you can trade. This game is all about just the RWBYverse, if you will, all these new characters that are popping up this volume will likely see their way into the game. You can experience that _RWBY_ culture with other fans and other community members. I'm really excited to see where this show goes, but more so where the community keeps pushing it.


	22. Building Argus

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Source: <https://roosterteeth.com/episode/crwby-behind-the-episode-2-building-argus>

* * *

> [Brian Lee](https://twitter.com/_BrianKLee_) (Art Associate Producer), [Brett Johnson](https://www.linkedin.com/in/brettjohnson88) (Lead Environment Modeler), [Weston T. Jones](https://twitter.com/westontjones?lang=en) (Environment Designer)

**BL** : What we're really proud about is this is probably one of the most ambitious cities that we've ever done in _RWBY_.

_Yang Xiao Long: Ladies and gentlemen, we have arrived in Argus._

**BL** : We are in the city of [Argus](https://rwby.wikia.com/wiki/Argus), which is honestly one of the first cities in the world of [Remnant](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Remnant) that you can see two different cultures mixed together.

**BJ** : It's a hybrid between [Atlas](https://rwby.wikia.com/wiki/Atlas) and [Mistral](https://rwby.wikia.com/wiki/Mistral_\(kingdom\)). This was honestly a breath of fresh air, to get a brand-new architectural style, a brand-new people, so to speak.

**BL** : It was a huge undertaking going into the season, trying to lay down the rules and the different types of environments.

**WJ** : We took a lot of inspirations from [San Francisco](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Architecture_of_San_Francisco) and Greco-Roman styles.

**BJ** : It is very much clear San Francisco. We have [trolleys](https://www.sftodo.com/sanfrancisco/cable-car-san-francisco/) going up and down these steep hills, it's all literally a down slope of a city, until you get to the Atlas base which is this giant like mountain fortress, so to speak. And you have Atlas basically watching over these people that have settled here.

**WJ** : So we wanted to start seeing some of Atlas' influences creeping in and how that affects life, and how that affects the architecture, and the technology that's around. Here's an early mood piece for the south gates, where the Team first enters the city. We knew it was going to be around sunset, we wanted the entry into Argus to be very beautiful and dramatic.

**BJ** : Trying to design these buildings on these steep hills was a fun little adventure. One of our talented artists, he built like a crazy amount of this by himself, and he's fantastic.

**WJ** : When we built Argus there was a lot of close collaboration between concept and modeling in this process. So we ended up building this sort of modular guide for the modelers. We started out with the basic building blocks, these big shapes, the big silhouettes of each building. We'll slap on the trim, the tower pieces, the windows, we've got all these different window styles and they can be combined with different curtain set ups, you have different doors that you can use just to add more variety. Modular shops, too, so we wanted to have both residential buildings and shop buildings. We tried to bring a whole new vegetation set to Argus. New lanterns for the streets. These are all the modular pieces organized in different ways.

**BL** : What I'm about to show you is [Jaune's sister's](https://rwby.wikia.com/wiki/Saphron_Cotta-Arc) house which is called the [Archome](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Arc_House), that you can definitely tell that there is Roman architecture in here. The flowering on the walls, the laid-back couches, all the way down to the color patterns, it's very much reds, tans, and yellows back then. Well something about this that's fun about these sets - they are getting bigger and bigger as we go through this season, and into next season.

**WJ** : I personally hadn't done a modular set like this before, so it was a challenge for me, and I think it worked out pretty well in the end.

**BL** : We're super grateful to the community. Honestly, it's really awesome being able to have such a tight-knit community because in a way it feels like the community is also part of the crew.


	23. Suit Up!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Source: <https://roosterteeth.com/episode/crwby-behind-the-episode-2-suit-up>

* * *

> [Luis 'Paco' Vazquez](https://twitter.com/pacobaggins) (Animation/Motion Capture Producer), [Kate Warner](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm1883496/) (Lead Camera & Layout Artist), [Joel Mann](https://twitter.com/spacedmann?lang=en) (Animation Director), [Melanie Stern](https://roosterteeth.wikia.com/wiki/Melanie_Stern) (Assistant Lead Animator)

_(Off-camera): Three, two, one, action!_

**LV** : Mocap stands for motion capture. We use motion capture everywhere we can, every time we have scenes of just characters interacting with each other, talking to each other, emotional scenes, action/fight scenes, if they're humanly possible we will actually do mocap for those as well.

**KW** : We have a mocap studio on-site. They get into their cool suits with all the little dots on it.

**LV** : We have a large volume of cameras surrounding us and what it does is it actually captures the motion of the actors.

**KW** : What we have on the monitor right here is usually the animatic running.

**LV** : We block the scene out with the animatic of the scenes. So all the voice work and all of the acting is already timed and done.

**KW** : They just acted out, and while they're doing that, it's all being captured. That all gets converted into these skeleton rigs that you see right here. If I scrub though it you'll see them move. This is the mocap.

**LV** : We actually rehearsed this scene over and over again until they get the timing down and the beats of the scene down. Our workflow allows for a lot of [on-the-spot](https://roosterteeth.com/series/on-the-spot) changes, you know, something will happen that looks like it works better so we'll actually start making changes to the scene as early as in the motion capture. It's almost like a little live action shoot for _RWBY_ before we actually get into the animation of everything. All the people that work on _RWBY_ are very creative, and sometimes people just love characters so much that they're like 'I need to do the mocap for that scene'.

**JM** : I was fortunate enough to be able to portray [Jaune](https://rwby.wikia.com/wiki/Jaune_Arc) in the scene where he is, you know, face to face with the monument to [Pyrrha Nikos](https://rwby.wikia.com/wiki/Pyrrha_Nikos).

**KW** : I think everybody who's touched this scene has had some feeling about it. It's a beautiful scene and I think it was good for Jaune's character development, too.

**JM** : You know he can finally come to terms and acceptance for what really happened and not also blame himself for it. Scenes like that are really challenging because there's a lot of subtle nuances in a performance like that. It's [Kerry](https://rwby.wikia.com/wiki/Kerry_Shawcross) directing that scene and it's definitely one of the more important scenes for him this season. He had very specific directions as far as, like, what kind of subtle things that he wanted Jaune to do with his head, the way that he wanted to turn, so that when he would just talk to animators about animating this scene he could say ' _use this as reference, like, this is actually how I want this scene_ '.

**LV** : It works as a really nice break for people just y'know working in front of their computer. It kind of just makes the whole process into just one efficient thing when the animators also due to the motion capture. Not only does that help them because they know what they're getting, but they can get into that emotional state as early as in the mocap stage.

**MS** : It's good activity both like physically and I feel like mentally. It's also just really cool for a minute to be someone else. You can really get into the heads of the characters.

_Jaune Arc: Thank you._


	24. Render Wrangling

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Source: <https://roosterteeth.com/episode/crwby-behind-the-episode-2-render-wrangling>

* * *

> [Eric J. Turman](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm8524303/) (Supervising Technical Director), Jacob Young (Quality Control Technician), [Christine Stuckart](https://twitter.com/art_HIC_ulate) (Assistant Lighting Lead), [Penelope Nederlander](https://twitter.com/baffledbyfoxes?lang=en) (Lead Compositor)

**ET** : _RWBY_ , from a technical standpoint, actually has quite a bit of challenges. You've got a number of different characters, vast landscapes, not only interiors but exteriors and having to represent that in all their variations.

**JY** : All the characters that you see on the screen are more than just an image, that image is made up of a lot of data.

**CS** : We use three separate softwares for what we do. We have a beautiful painterly quality that comes out of [Maya](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autodesk_Maya) with all the environments. We have a [cel shaded](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cel_shading) aesthetic that we get out of [Max](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autodesk_3ds_Max) for that really nice toon shading that you see on the characters. We also use [Houdini](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Houdini_\(software\)) to generate the crowds and effects.

**ET** : We have to have three packages function basically like a cohesive unit, as if they were one. Cameras, frames, characters - it all has to line up exactly. The tech team has created just a myriad of tools. The artist is able to push a button and literally a thousand-plus processes happen in the background.

**CS** : Now that everything is imported we just hit up 'set up scene' and you can see down at the bottom all of the things it is doing. Setting up all these [render layers](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Render_layers), calculating all the geometry, it's calculating all the textures, and then it's thinking about the lights. Another pass we use every single shot is the utility pass for the character. And it has mattes. All this automation means that we're not doing every single thing by hand.

**ET** : That is going to let them iterate more, target in on what the director, what his vision is, or her vision is. Ultimately, get a better product for the viewers.

**PN** : Comp is the department that takes all the layers that gets renders, and all of the effects, and layers it together. The giant mech is really kind of going to be a chance for comp to show off some of its tricks. It's big, it's tech-y, it represents the pinnacle of technology that Atlas produces. In this scene, we see our heroes narrowly avoiding a giant electrical blast. It's a really cool one because it's a comp effect. Even though it's a miss, it doesn't hit the airship, there's so much like [Dust](https://rwby.wikia.com/wiki/Dust) electricity that it arcs off and still hits and damages the ship.

**JY** : Each object in the scene is individually rendered. In all those parts of the process, something can failure. My job is going and finding out what that issue might be. This is called [Royal Render](http://www.royalrender.de/help8/index.html?Maya.html), and all of us use it. This is kind of a way we find out if the renders are getting through. So we have a job rendering here. As we can see these caution signs appear. That's how I know that something is going wrong in the scene. Usually I would find the artist associated with this job, have them open it, and we would discuss, like, what the render logs are saying are potentially wrong with their scene. When it gets fixed, we send it back through the pipeline and we have ways to swap out the broken asset for the fixed asset, and figure out how to fix that. Some are fairly straightforward and fairly easy, and then others are really obscure, and those ones I feel like a detective, I guess, going through.

**ET** : I'm really proud of what the team has accomplished, not only my team, but the entire animation team. Everything that we're doing really is geared towards, it's focused on, the community.

**PN** : Often times I see the episode for the first time, at home, [Saturday morning](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturday-morning_cartoon), with everyone else. And it becomes really exciting to like see your work come together in this finished product that tells a really awesome story and it's really a privilege to be a part of that.


	25. Hey, Look at This! Script to Storyboard

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Source: <https://roosterteeth.com/episode/crwby-behind-the-episode-2-hey-look-at-this-script-to-storyboard>

* * *

> [Rob Thomson](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm3851834/) (Layout Producer), [Rachel Doda](https://twitter.com/rami_doda?lang=en) (Storyboard Artist), [Kevin Harger](https://roosterteeth.wikia.com/wiki/Kevin_Harger) (Storyboard Artist), [Kate Warner](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm1883496/) (Lead Camera & Layout Artist)

**RT** : When it got to the last few scripts for this season, and we read about [the mech](https://rwby.wikia.com/wiki/Giant_Mech), it's definitely one of those big asks where it's like, ' _how are we going to do this_ '? Then we basically started off on the storyboard process so that's where Rachel Doda actually got in.

**RD** : Yeah, the mech, dude, this thing can go 360, it's awesome. Usually [thumbnails](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thumbnail) they're essentially drawings as big as your thumb, they're not any bigger than that because you're just trying to get the overall composition to overall character structure. I just really was looking for compositions and different angles I could get.

**KH** : We do most of the [storyboarding](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Storyboard) in [Storyboard Pro Toon Boom](https://www.toonboom.com/products/storyboardpro). You can animate your boards and in a really intuitive way. Basically gives us storyboard artists ultimately the freedom that they're looking for.

**RD** : We take those thumbnails and we essentially draw them into Toon Boom. I'll then go in and maybe draw something like even just a single panel, put all the beats in there, and then break them out into what we call breakdowns. Then I'll go with that initial layout set up a camera so that we can see the flow here. This mech is huge so I wanted to get that sense of scale. There's a shot where [Jaune](https://rwby.wikia.com/wiki/Jaune_Arc) is running up to [Nora](https://rwby.wikia.com/wiki/Nora_Valkyrie). Background we see the mech, and as it comes into foreground you just see this giant hand just swat these two people. And this is something that the director really wanted.

**RT** : The camera I mean it's what really tells the story. Whenever a director is using a camera they're saying ' _hey look at this, look here_ '.

**RD** : We also use a lot of pop zooms in this one just because the robot is so huge.

**KH** : This is [the fight](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Battle_Pages/Blake_and_Yang_vs._Adam) between [Blake](https://rwby.wikia.com/wiki/Blake_Belladonna) and [Adam](https://rwby.wikia.com/wiki/Adam_Taurus). I wanted to get as much intensity into this scene, and energy, and drama as possible. We're going to be flying through the woods as Adam is chasing Blake. Huge trees, slash slash. There's a lot of intense sound effects, intense music as I'm boarding and I'm thinking about all that and trying to play through it in my head. So she's whipping around through the trees like [Spider-Man](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spider-Man).

**RT** : Worked really hard to make sure there's a lot of emotion and expression in everything else that we're looking for is coming through.

**KW** : Right now I'm working on staging maps for the mech fight. When I put these together, first I study the animatic and I make a whole bunch of notes about direction, which way everybody's facing. [JNR](https://rwby.wikia.com/wiki/JNPR) has gone this way, [Ruby's](https://rwby.wikia.com/wiki/Ruby_Rose) gone straight up into the air. This is where [Weiss](https://rwby.wikia.com/wiki/Weiss_Schnee) has frozen the robot's legs in the water and it stumbles and it crashes into the back of the cliff. JNR then runs over to try and get up close and personal, as [Qrow](https://rwby.wikia.com/wiki/Qrow_Branwen) says, with it. We need to do all of this mainly for continuity. We hand these files off to Animation. Everybody needs to be on the same page about placement.

**RT** : It's pretty awe-inspiring the level of talent that we have in the studio and the people that are, again, working like crazy just to make this show so much better for the fans and for everybody.

**RD** : I love anime. I was also a fan of _RWBY_ before jumping on. From the perspective of a _RWBY_ fan this is probably one of my favorite volumes. And I think, like, if you put enough love into something, and you like what you're doing, then it's going to show.


	26. The Other 50%

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Source: <https://roosterteeth.com/episode/crwby-behind-the-episode-2-the-other-50>

* * *

> [Laura Yates](https://twitter.com/laurayates) (Post Production Supervisor), [Philip Spann](https://twitter.com/spannsounds) (Audio Engineer), [Chris Kokkinos](https://twitter.com/christhefer) (Audio Lead), [Alena Lecorchick](https://twitter.com/AlenaLecorchick) (Audio Engineer)

**LY** : What really distinguishes working in post-production in animation is that it's an additive process rather than subtractive. We take the visual portion that's being created and basically add the other 50%, which is audio.

**PS** : In animation you know there's no production audio. We start with nothing but dialogue. And we basically get to create a whole world of sound.

**CK** : When I have conversations with comp artists or animators we always talk about how it doesn't fully feel like it's complete until sound has gone in. This has probably been one of the best-sounding seasons so far. Our Foley has never sounded this good.

**AL** : Foley is really us performing in the background all the little sounds that you hear. We're the ones that are actually performing that action with objects that we have in the studio. It just helps sell the world and sell the environment. Fights are interesting just because of how much work that has to help stylizing the sound. Doing a normal punch on something is just going to give you a weak sound. But if you really want to convey, like, a hard punch, a bone-cracking punch, you'll add maybe some celery crunching. Some of the Foley that I do for fights is things with cloth. Whenever somebody throws a punch there's not just a _whoosh_ , it's also a _[cloth sound effect?]_. The cloth helps give that whoosh a little bit of texture. After I record them all I'll send it off to mix.

**PS** : We finally get to take the sound effects and the dialogue and the music and work them together into that whole immersive soundscape.

**CK** : His grasp and understanding of mêlée and combat and mix just ties a beautiful bow on top of it.

**PS** : And one of the ways I will approach fights is I will very carefully kind of frame through everything, action by action, and drop a lot of markers. Things I think about is what can I do to increase the readability of this fight? What sounds are important to help the audience understand what's going on? So if a character whiffs, that's almost as important as whenever they connect, even though there's no impact.

**CK** : The number one thing when it comes to mixing fights is looking at how dynamic you can make it feel.

**PS** : When I see something like this section of six hits, I try to think of that like, if I had congas in front of me, if I was in a drum line, what pitches would I select to play those notes on? Together I think it just gives it sort of a flow kind of like the choreography has a flow. And sometimes the animators will give you something that isn't like really physically possible to make with the sound, like this machine gun punch here with [Yang](http://rwby.wikia.com/wiki/Yang_Xiao_Long). There's no way I could 1-to-1 sync that. So inside of this I've got like a silenced machine gun, I've got bullet ricochets against metal, I've got a jackhammer, and I've gone ahead and synced punches to the jackhammer. And then I've gone through and I've highlighted specific frequencies to make them sound like punches instead of jackhammers. That all together...

Whenever they give you something fun, the only thing you can respond with is something equally fun, I think, to work with. We get to do all this immersive stuff, but your main job is to almost be invisible as you're doing it.

**CK** : What I hope our community experiences when they see are show, and when they listen to our sounds, is that they're there, they're there with the characters. And I do think that's a by-product of having all these people on the team who really just love and enjoy what they do.

**LY** : And we're really looking forward to just seeing how far we can take this show and these characters to continue telling their story.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Further Reading:
> 
> · Team_SKGA (January 23, 2019). ["Team_SKGA comments on CRWBY S2E12 THUMBNAIL & Description"](https://www.reddit.com/r/RWBY/comments/aj8cn3/crwby_s2e12_thumbnail_description/eetm5cm/). [reddit](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reddit).


	27. Focus & Communication

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Source: <https://roosterteeth.com/episode/crwby-behind-the-episode-2-focus-communication>

* * *

> [Kerry Shawcross](https://twitter.com/kerryshawcross) (Director), [Koen Wooten](https://twitter.com/woot10) (Supervising Producer), [Joe Clary](https://twitter.com/JoeyBC) (Lead Producer), [Shane Davis](https://twitter.com/boulderblod) (Visual Post Producer), [Connor Pickens](https://twitter.com/condorpickens) (Co-Director)

**KS** : I've been working on this show for a very long time, basically since Day 2. [Monty](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monty_Oum) had his dream, had his idea, and came in the next day and was like, ' _alright let's make an anime together_ ', and I was like ' _cool, let's do it_ '. And here we are, six-plus years later.

**KW** : When we first started on _RWBY_ Volume 6, Kerry told us and [Miles](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Miles_Luna) told us that this was going to be a be a big season. I had to laugh because they told me in the first episode that we'd have a train. You have something like that moving that fast covering that much ground and a set that needs to be that big, that alone told me how big the season was going to be.

**KS** : I think Volume 6 was absolutely one of my favorite seasons to work on. Probably the hardest season we've really ever done. At least in terms of scope.

**KW** : The thing about _RWBY_ and the way that it has been handled for some time is that it's a traveling show.

**JC** : [The Team](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/RWBY_\(team\)) is moving every episode, going to [new places](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Argus), discovering new things, a lot of new sets, a lot of new assets, things that on the technical and production side we have to work on.

_Ruby Rose: I'm a Huntress. My team and I are heading to the Leviathan and can weaken it for you to attack._

**SD** : From the producer side we go okay how can we implement this into the pipeline. And how can we have this visually sing on-screen.

**KW** : A producer is somebody who has perspective. It's about understanding how each team works, what their needs are. The amount of intelligence and thoughtfulness that has to go into solving problems each and every day is gargantuan.

**KS** : Something about this year's story just really fell into place for us early on. Miles and I write the scripts but as it goes through storyboards, and as it goes through camera, and animation, and asset, everybody adds something to it.

**JC** : We try to foster an environment that allows the artists to be artists, to not have to worry about technical things, and can just focus on their art and what they're best at.

**KS** : More than anything that's my job is to not tell everybody what to do. Every lead on the team, every supervisor, every producer, always wants to make it the best they can make the show, and we work with a ton of really creative and smart people, and it's how to make all of their ideas work together as well, too.

**CP** : A large part of what I think the job of director is, is just harnessing all that creativity and letting people make their own choices and bring stuff to the show. For instance in the [Chapter 11](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/The_Lady_in_the_Shoe) [fight](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Battle_Pages/Ruby%27s_Party_vs._Cordovin) there was a bit where Ruby is kind of hanging on to this [giant mech](https://rwby.fandom.com/wiki/Colossus) and she slips down in front of the visor. And an animator asked, 'well I was thinking maybe they could just have a cute little moment where she kind of waves'. Like that wasn't in the script, that wasn't in our initial brain-dep[?], but that was like, that's great, like, go do that, and that's like one of my favorite moments of that fight.

**JC** : Staying on schedule and staying communicating is the most important thing. It's a very big pipeline from storyboards all the way through post and audio. And we need people in each of those departments staying focused and communicating to everybody else.

**CP** : We have desk reviews and desk reviews are great. It gives the animators a chance to ask questions in real-time, and you can give them feedback in real-time. And if I'm in a space with a person and I can just show them, I think a lot of times it's pretty illuminating because there's just some concepts that are hard to explain in written format.

**KS** : The best part of working about here is hands-down the people that we get to work with.

**KW** : We get to make a show that we're really proud of but I think at the end of it all, I think we're most proud of the relationship and the team and the studio we've built.

**JC** : Everybody's very passionate about this show, so they want to make it the best they can. They want to leave their mark. They want to create a legacy that will be bigger then just them as individuals.

**KS** : I know how much this show means to a lot of people, and this show means a lot to me. I just want to make this show the best it can be, because we do get messages of people saying they're going through a rough time, but, you know, they saw the work that we're doing and they're now on their own creative path. It feels like we're all doing something really worthwhile here. So I really hope everybody enjoyed this volume, because I know that we did.

_Atlas ATC: Mantis 5-1, welcome home._


End file.
